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My Octopus Teacher, a 2020 Netflix Original documentary, directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed, might already be the most watched and talked about cephalopod drama since Kirk Douglas fought the giant squid in the 1954 Walt Disney epic 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, based on the 1870 Jules Verne novel of the same title. Much like him, you might feel the tides turn, and you might also fall in love.(Beth Clifton collage) Or, “The Call of the Wild” underwater

#MY TEACHER THE OCTOPUS MOVIE#

You might think you’re watching just another movie about animals until, about 20 minutes in, a tentacle unwinds and reaches out to grasp Foster’s hand. If nothing else, Ehrlich and Reed’s documentary is another reminder of how little we know about the creatures who share this planet with us, and how much we assume in the hierarchy of species we’ve devised.

Her talent for camouflage and survival are impressive, her intelligence astounding, her trust in Foster deeply moving. We’re along for the ride as Foster watches his cephalopod friend hunting crabs and lobster, being hunted by sharks, and indulging in a comic gambol with a school of fish.

It’s never saccharine or simplistic, though, and it is endlessly surprising. There’s a touch of Spielbergian human-alien connection in the story it tells, a sense of wonder and mystery enhanced by Kevin Smuts’ score. Unlike the cinematically daring Gunda, which removes the human voice from its narrative, to profound effect, Teacher is very much about interaction between humans and other species, and its positive potential.

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There isn’t a telltale seam in the immersive proceedings, not a crack in the exquisite aquatic palette or the underwater light. Beyond the lengthy editing process, a team of postproduction whizzes had to make footage from a wide array of cameras visually cohesive. My Octopus Teacher is a dazzling technical achievement, especially when you consider that helmers Ehrlich and Reed and editor Dan Schwalm were faced with 3,000 hours of footage, shot over a period of eight years that began long before Foster encountered the title animal. In turn, his interactions with the octopus inspire a friend of his, cinematographer Roger Horrocks, to join him in the surf with his camera.

It turns out that his curiosity is matched by that of the octopus he visits in his daily dives, and she inspires Foster, who had explored animal tracking and shamanic cultures of the Kalahari in films he made with his brother, to pick up his camera again. But Foster is so likably low-key and humble a screen presence, and his point of view is so interested in the other, that any such fears are quickly dispelled. For a few brief moments in its early going, My Octopus Teacher threatens to veer into the dreaded territory of New Age self-help. The urgency to heal himself was heightened by his desire to be a good father to his school-age son, Tom (who eventually becomes a diver in his own right, as well as providing the film’s drone footage).

#MY TEACHER THE OCTOPUS HOW TO#

In voiceover and onscreen interviews, Foster explains that he returned to diving, a childhood joy, at a point when he felt depleted by work and unsure how to go on. “The cold upgrades the brain,” he tells us. At the outset of his adventure, the invigorating cold is also a lifeline for him, a way back to a sense of purpose. He wants a direct experience with the environment, and aims to be as nonintrusive as possible among the fish and mollusks. Its waters are, however, bracingly cold, dipping below 50 degrees Fahrenheit, and Foster goes in sans wetsuit or scuba gear.

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The story unfolds with deceptive simplicity and startling beauty in a patch of sea off South Africa’s Western Cape that’s protected by a thick kelp forest, and therefore relatively calm. But it is the first to chronicle a single sea creature’s story from such a personal, openhearted perspective, revealing not just emotional connections but animal behaviors previously unknown to scientists. My Octopus Teacher is not the first documentary to plunge us into the otherworldly flora and fauna of Earth’s oceans - a number of films from MacGillivray Freeman and Imax have done so in magnificent fashion.

My teacher the octopus